Chapter Text
Something is poking Rumi in the cheek. Not hard, but repeated. Insistent.
She groans— and the sound is a little lower and rougher than she's used to, but her throat feels like someone closed a vice around it and then made her gargle gravel for two hours— before turning her head slightly to the left in an attempt to escape. The poking thing follows her, relentless.
Someone giggles above her.
It takes longer than it should for Rumi to recognize the sound. Longer still for her to pry her eyelids apart enough to pair a face with it.
Zoey looks exhausted. Makeup smudged all across her face in a horrendous mash of glitter and color, leaving her looking like a Jackson Pollock rendition of a raccoon with a slightly goofy smile and flyaway curls. She's still in her costume, though the jacket has been shucked, and it takes Rumi another embarrassingly long couple seconds for her to remember why her top is a completely different color than she remembers the Golden costumes being.
It hits her like a freight train. Or, perhaps, a meteor strike.
The Idol awards. Takedown. Backstage— weapons. Words. Fear. Guilt. Shame. Don't leave. Don't leave— Jinu. Celine. Namsan Tower. Jinu.
They made it home. Somehow. Rumi doesn't really remember. At least, not much more than the faint, numbing burn of her patterns, abject exhaustion, and stumbling off the stage with both girls pressed into her sides like they were the only things holding her up. Someone called a car, she can't remember who, and then she must've fallen asleep because the next thing she even vaguely recalls is being manhandled into the elevator and then deposited on the couch before two familiar weights crashed down on either side.
And now she's here. Still on said couch, Zoey staring down at her with a rapidly sobering face as she watches the journey of Rumi remembering all that it took for them to get here. She offers another smile, this one less goofy and more tentative.
"Mira made breakfast," she offers. Softly. Shy. An olive branch. "American breakfast."
That's good, some distant, still functioning part of Rumi's brain notes. Mira only makes American breakfast on special occasions. Or when she feels the need to apologize for something. Not that Rumi really wants an apology for last night, at least, not from Mira, but it's a start. Means that she's not still angry, at least.
She should be, a different part of Rumi's brain argues. It's the same one that had screamed so loudly last night she ended up teleporting all the way to Jeju Island and—
Rumi shakes her head. Cutting the thought off before it can fully process.
"She didn't-" have to do that is how Rumi wanted to finish that sentence. Instead her voice cuts into a wheezing, choked cough.
Zoey's eyes widen, arms stretching forward, hovering, even as Rumi attempts to pull herself into a sitting position.
She doesn't make it very far.
Her stomach rolls at the shift in perspective and her limbs feel strangely shaky, like someone's removed the bones and all that's left behind are muscles struggling to hold their shape. Only about halfway to a sitting position her arms collapse and Zoey yelps as she surges forward to catch.
Rumi's vision swims. Black spots, whether from the nausea or the lack of oxygen is unclear.
Distantly, she hears another voice— Mira, probably— shouting, but she can't parse the words. Her whole word has coalesced down to the sudden and absolute certainty that she is going to throw up.
Zoey's hands are on her shoulders. Propping her upright as the coughs continue to wrack her body like a western demon attempting to escape. The irony is not lost on her.
"Rumi–" she's saying, close. Very close. There's breath on her face. "Rumi, breathe!"
Rumi does. Sucks in a deep gasp before something in her chest buckles and Zoey's hands disappear as her shoulders dissolve into red mist.
She remanifests just in front of the kitchen sink and all but collapses into it before the first retch hits her.
It's so easy to forget how much throwing up sucks until you're actively doing it.
Somewhere to her left there's another startled shout. A crash, then hands on her again, though these are larger. Dazedly, Rumi thinks that she should probably push them off, though she can't quite remember why.
They circle around her, combing escaped strands of hair from her face even as she continues to heave whatever contents still sat in her stomach. When was the last time she ate? Before the concert? No, she'd been too nervous. Breakfast? Had she eaten breakfast?
It's blurring together. All the events of the last 24 hours and anything before them. Rumi can't remember what she's throwing up, only that she is, and as each choked spasm wracks her she becomes more and more certain that there isn't actually anything for her to be throwing up. It's just bile and stomach acid.
There's a voice in her ear. Low and soothing. Mira, then.
"–there we go. It's over. It's all over, you did it." Mira's voice fades back into something parsable just as the last of the spasms wracks Rumi's body. The only thing keeping her from being hung over the lip of the sink like a wet rag is the arm tightly wound around her waist.
Rumi spits once more. Whether to get the taste of bile out of her mouth or to be petulant is anyone's guess. Mira hums anyway, and the feeling of it pressed so close to Rumi's spine is enough to make the last of the strength in her limbs flee.
She collapses. Or, would, if Mira didn't grunt with the sudden increase in weight and adjust her grip so that Rumi was leant more against her torso than the sink.
"Shit— Zoey! I think she's passing out!"
Rumi tries to voice otherwise, but it comes out in a hoarse, crackling groan that doesn't exactly sound cognizant, and she understands the sentiment now. Bare feet thump against the tile and then a second set of hands grasp the sides of her face.
Zoey's eyes are wide. Pupils shrunken and brows knit so tightly together they look to be attempting to kiss. The thought summons something that might've been a chuckle, but breaks into another fit of coughs before it can come to fruition.
"Her eyes are open—" Zoey starts, probably directed towards Mira, before her gaze darts back to Rumi's. "Rumi, can you— holy shit you're burning!"
On either side of Rumi's face her fingers flex, resisting the urge to retract. A pang of regret floods through Rumi's chest even as she knows that she has no control over her body's temperature.
"Sorry." She mutters anyway. The word sounds like it was tugged from the bottom of the ocean.
"Hey, no," Mira snaps from behind her, shaking her a little for good measure. "No apologies. We'll get there when you aren't actively trying to die. Again. Seriously, can you go 24 hours without worrying the fuck out of us?!"
There's a truth to those words, Rumi knows, but there's also that familiar exasperation that feels like a balm against her sore, battered heart. So she tugs out a laugh that almost doesn't sound like a cough.
"No."
Mira sputters and Zoey makes a weak, startled guffaw.
"We–we should get you back on the couch. Or, uh, your room? I don't think you should be standing right now."
Rumi grunts her agreement, and Mira performs some strange maneuver that Rumi can't quite follow, but ends with being held bridal style against her chest.
"Where to, princess?" She asks, but all Rumi manages is a stilted, awkward shrug. Zoey's hands have left her face and she misses them immensely.
"Rumi?"
"Duzn't ma'er," she mumbles. Careful not to use too much breath for fear of setting off another coughing fit. "jus… bucket?"
She hopes that, somehow, they managed to turn that into something coherent.
Zoey's gaze slides from her to a point over her shoulder that must be Mira. They're both silent, having one of those countless eye-contact-only conversations that Rumi has never been able to understand. Even early on in their training, before the patterns were big enough to necessitate nearly as much distance.
They seem to come to an agreement, because Zoey nods slightly before flitting off in a direction that Rumi doesn't have it in her to track. Mira sighs, adjusts her grip, and carries her off towards the stairs.
Bedroom it is, evidently. Rumi tries not to let the flicker of disappointment show.
It makes sense, she supposes. She'll be out of the way and there's an ensuite so she won't have to bother them every time she has to drag herself up. It'll give them plenty of privacy to discuss what to do now that everything is out in the open. The new honmoon is stable, she thinks. At the very least it hadn't collapsed overnight. They should probably stay together long enough to make sure it isn't going to split before they go their separate ways. Or, Rumi thinks dully, before Mira and Zoey send her back to Jeju and continue without her.
It's the least she can do to remain out of the way while they iron out the details. She's done enough harm already with her decision making. She owes it to them to let them do it this once.
All too soon, she's set down on a soft, horizontal surface.
"I'll be right back," Mira whispers, pressing something into the crown of Rumi's head that might be a hand meant to soothe. Rumi shivers, feeling guilt and something else settle heavily in the pit of her stomach. She feels nauseous again. She tries to articulate that but only manages another groan.
Mira pauses, then strokes a couple fingers over the side of Rumi's face.
"Can you open your eyes for me, pretty girl? Please?"
Rumi does, not remembering when she'd let them close, and realizes quickly that this is not her bedroom.
It's Mira's. Easily the largest of theirs, with the biggest bed. An Alaskan king, according to Zoey.
"Wh-whu—" Rumi starts, and then stops as her stomach gives a violent jolt and all she can do to stop herself is clamp her teeth shut and squeeze her eyes closed. Mira hisses– a curse, maybe? And then she's being pulled back into a sitting position and something that feels like a trashcan is shoved into her hands.
"It's okay," Mira tells her, even though it's not. "I got you."
Rumi whines. Something high-pitched and a little too harmonic to be human. Around them, the honmoon twitches in response. Though, thankfully, there's no hint of that horrible rending pink.
Rumi opens her eyes, just a little. To see Mira's reaction, maybe? But the moment she does the nausea returns tenfold and then she's heaving into Mira's trashcan like there's no tomorrow.
It breaks into a sob the moment the first heave is over. Mira shushes her, rubs a hand over her shaking, sweaty shoulders, and mutters something soft and soothing that Rumi doesn't deserve. That just makes it worse.
She heaves. Once. Twice. She loses count somewhere around the fifth. There's nothing actually coming up. If she did have anything in her, it was left in the kitchen sink. Now it's just spit and miserable spasms that steal what little breath Rumi manages to suck in between each heave.
She's never been more thankful to not have a gag reflex.
Mira holds her through it all. Each gasp, each whimper, each sob. The entire time quiet assurances pressed into Rumi's skin like she was trying to embed them there. It's only once she's managed a full minute without another spasm that she takes the can from her and lowers her back to the bed.
Rumi lets her.
"I'll be right back," she whispers and Rumi's about 70% sure she said that already, but the time is blurring together again. She swears that she blinks and then Mira's standing over her with a bowl and a small hand towel. The time in between her leaving and returning lost.
"Open your mouth," she instructs and Rumi does. Any semblance of fight or protest long since having abandoned her. The thermometer clicks a little awkwardly as Mira's first attempt to stick it under her tongue has it catching on teeth that weren't that sharp just a day ago.
Rumi thinks she should be upset about that. She doesn't have the energy for it now.
A finger tucks under her chin, closing her mouth, and then there's a cloth carefully wiping across her face.
Makeup, she realizes after almost a minute of uninterrupted scrubbing. The thermometer beeps and Mira pulls it from her, hissing at the number that it must display.
"Jesus, Ru."
Rumi opens her eyes. Forces them to focus on the pink shape hovering above her.
For all accusations of Mira's stoicism, Rumi thinks that she's actually remarkably easy to read. Especially when it came to her concern. Her brows knit, thin, high, and her lips press tightly together like they were battling to see which was stronger.
"Bad?" Rumi whispers. Mira's gaze flickers back to hers.
"Considering I've never seen you with so much as a cold and now you're pushing the limits of 'hospital now,' yeah. I'd say so."
Rumi laughs. A bit too loudly. Her chest rattles something fierce with the force and her coughing fit has actual tears sliding down the sides of her face from the force. Mira jerks her back into a sitting position but Rumi does her best to wave her off.
"Fine, fine— I'm—" she lets out a final echoing cough before slumping back down. Panting. "—fine."
"You're really not." Mira deadpans, but lets her lay back.
For a moment both of them are quiet. Rumi's panting fills the room. Then, Mira's brows twitch.
"I… I know now isn't the time, but I'm realizing that actually I haven't seen you get sick. Like, ever. Is that—"
"A demon thing?" Rumi whispers. "Probably. Celine always said I had a strong immune system."
Mira makes a face. One that Rumi would've struggled to decipher even if her vision wasn't so blurry.
"Celine… knows?"
Rumi nods. Then stops when it makes her stomach clench.
Before Mira can press that line of questioning any further the bedroom door bursts open and Zoey stumbles in with so many items in her arms Rumi can't make out her face.
"Okay!" she chirps, dumping them all onto the bed and, consequently, Rumi's lap. "I got water, anti-nausea medicine, decongestant, cough syrup, fever reducers, a fresh change of clothes, and~" she draws out the last word as she reaches into her pocket and produces Rumi's stuffed bear, very creatively named: "Gom!"
She presses the bear into Rumi's hands.
"I also called Bobby," she continues, "which— we really need to sit down and have a talk with him soon about what happened because he sounded so worried— and he said he'd make sure that we're left undisturbed for the next three days at least."
"Three days?" Mira questions, tilting her head in question.
"Gives Rumi time to recover," Zoey gestures in her direction. "And hopefully time for us to… talk."
The word hung over the three of them like a thundercloud. Or, perhaps, a guillotine. It depended on if it was going to fall over all three of them or just Rumi.
Her fingers tightened slightly around Gom, and she realized with sudden and startling clarity that Zoey had seen her ill and, on top of retrieving all of the practical concerns that came with it, also went out of her way to grab something meant to bring her comfort. Hell, they'd brought her to Mira's room, not her own, so they could keep an eye on her while also maintaining a sense of comfort and an enclosed, private space should she ask for it.
Affection bursts, hot and tight, inside of Rumi's chest. Affection and guilt and a deep aching loneliness that Rumi had thought she'd gotten used to long ago but now hurt just as rawly as it did when she had been 17 and realizing what it would truly mean to hide what she was from her fellow hunters.
"Shit— Rumi. Hey, Rumi-" hands on her cheeks. Brushing away the tears that Rumi hadn't even realized that she'd started crying. A second set grasping her hands over Gom. "Hey, what's wrong—"
"'m sorry," Rumi whimpers. Blubbering and wet and raspy and all the things that make someone's voice sound absolutely disgusting. "Sorry. I shouldn't— I still owe— I can't— please don't leave."
The words echo. That same rumbling, dual tone that she'd used the night before. The hands on her tighten, the ones on her face curve around her jaw and the ones on her hands squeeze like they're afraid they'd disappear.
"Easy there, Tiger." Mira rumbles, flexing the fingers wound around Rumi's. "We aren't going anywhere. Like I said, we'll have that talk, but not right now. Not until you're better."
"Even then," Zoey continues, still brushing beneath Rumi's stubbornly leaking eyes. "We aren't going anywhere. Or did you think all that magical weaving a new honmoon from our souls was just for show?"
Rumi laughs, though she's unsure if from relief or simple absurdity.
"'m sorry," she mutters still. Unable to come up with anything else. Zoey tuts, shaking her a little.
"Nope." She punctuates the declaration with a finger to the tip of Rumi's nose, eliciting a startled grunt that might've been a squeak if her throat didn't still feel like it was full of rocks. "Apology not accepted. I don't wanna hear another word out of you until you've downed half a bottle of water and taken at least the fever reducers and the anti-nausea meds. The rest we can figure out later. I really don't think you should take the cough syrup with the dramamine though because they're both supposed to make your sleepy and that's probably not good to combine—"
"Water." Mira cuts in, holding the offending bottle and twisting the cap off in one quick, seamless motion before thrusting it under Rumi's chin. "Now."
It takes a bit of negotiating, but eventually they settle on Rumi finishing the bottle, or at least half of it, before they get her changed into the set of pajamas Zoey had procured from her room.
Mira has to hold her up the entire time. Her body still too weak and too dizzy to bear her own weight while Zoey tugs off her costume pieces with a care that feels borderline reverent.
There's an irony in this, Rumi is sure. She's been so careful to keep herself hidden. And now, finally, once her patterns have spread to the point that she couldn't hide them even if she wanted, she's left helpless as her girls strip her bare.
There's surrender in this, yes, but also pain because there is no choice in it. Still so many conversations they need to have. Explanations, apologies, forgiveness to be begged for, but all of it has to wait.
Eventually she's lowered back to the bed. Tucked carefully and snugly between the covers and mattress. Rumi had never really had a reason to wonder what Mira's sheets felt like and she's somewhat amused to find out that they are, in fact, satin. Appropriate, though not really the first choice she would've gone to for a sick bed.
She doesn't have it in her to complain, even as it's far too early for the meds to be kicking in, Rumi can tell that she's fading fast. Zoey settles Gom back into her hands and it's all she can do to twitch her fingers into a curled grip rather than letting him tumble to the floor.
Rumi manages a blink. Slow and sleepy. And hopes, somehow, it conveys all that she can't bring herself to say. Gratitude. Sorrow. Affection so deep and warm it feels more like a pool of molten lava she's just discovered within herself.
Zoey braves a smile, but it is tight and pinched with something that Rumi can't name. It's mirrored in the tension in Mira's shoulders.
"You can sleep, Rums," Zoey whispers in spite of it. Stroking a hand down the side of Rumi's face and tucking a loose strand of hair out of the way. "we'll be here the whole time."
The shadow behind her, which must be Mira, nods their agreement and Rumi's next blink is even slower than the last.
"m'kay," she says. Or, she thinks she does. Her mouth feels like it's connected by a loose wire. Only the occasional spark making it through. "Thank you… for staying…"
Something in Zoey's expression crumples, but Rumi's eyes are sliding closed again before she can try and decipher it.
Rumi never got sick as a child. Never. The closest thing had been when she was eight and snapped her fibula after a bad fall during training. Even then, it had been almost uneventful. Honmoon healing combined with Rumi's demon-half meant that even more severe injuries tended to fade after a couple days.
(Once, when she was twenty a hunt had gone sideways and she ended up thrown onto a high-way and hit by a car. Her spine had snapped under the impact, but by the time Zoey and Mira had found her— a half-hour at most— she was wiggling feeling back into her toes like she'd simply sat on them strangely.)
That young though, and with her connection to the Honmoon unrefined by almost two decades of training, the healing process was much slower and far more reliant on her demon nature.
As such she was bedridden for three days. The first was too laden with painkillers and Celine's fretful lectures on 'carelessness' for Rumi to remember much of it, but the other two sat in the back of her childhood memories like silent, watchful guardians.
It wasn't that Celine was a neglectful parent guardian. She wasn't, Rumi had never had to worry about a lack of anything. Food, clothes, shelter, toys. All provided without so much as a hum of desire from Rumi. This was no different.
Her leg was tended by a doctor that Celine kept on her payroll specifically because he was buried in so many NDAs he might as well have been as soul bound to her as the demons to Gwi-ma. A sickbed thoroughly prepared for all that a child could ask for while they recovered. Stuffed toys stacked to one side, books to the other. Even a small tv wheeled in for Rumi to flick through should the fancy strike her. There was a little lunchbox on the nightstand full of snacks, and a matching cooler with milkis and juice pouches if she got thirsty.
Celine wasn't a neglectful guardian. She just wasn't always a present one.
Rumi understood, of course. With her mother and Tae-heenim gone the only person left to uphold the honmoon was Celine. On top of that, as the only currently active hunter she had to take on all hunts solo. Add to that owning a record company large and respected enough to launch Rumi's inevitable debut to the heights it would need to be, and Rumi was honestly surprised that Celine had been around as often as she was.
That didn't change the fact that Rumi was eight, in pain, and just wanted her eomma guardian.
She tried to distract herself. Managed to skim her way through a couple of the books but quickly lost interest as the dull ache in her left leg grew steadily and steadily sharper, sapping away her focus. After that she tried a movie. More for the simple background noise than anything, her ability to focus still notwithstanding. Unfortunately Rumi couldn't actually sit up enough to put anything in the old VCR and so had to settle for flipping through channels until she found something that wasn't as mind-numbingly boring as the news or variety shows.
Again, the ache only grew sharper and even the low roar of the cartoon she'd settled on fell into background noise.
So Rumi grabbed one of the stuffed toys. She was never very creative with the names, and her vision was blurred from a combination of the fading painkillers and tears welling at the corners of her eyes, so she could only make out the vague, fluffy shape.
She squeezed it. Cloth was squished.
Rumi imagined, for a moment, that she was the one being squished.
Slowly, almost like she feared being caught, Rumi brought the stuffed something to her chest and enclosed it in a hug.
She imagined what it would feel like. To be held like that.
Rumi wasn't a large child, and the stuffed toy wasn't small, but it was still smaller than her. Small enough to be enveloped almost entirely even by her then too-narrow shoulders. Small enough to rest in such a way that, should something have tried to grab it, they'd have to go through Rumi first to do it.
Rumi imagined it would be nice. Warm. Soft. Safe.
Time passed. Rumi held her stuffed animal. Her leg continued to grow more and more uncomfortable.
No one came to check on her. Not when the distant light of the sun against the far wall lowered and deepened from a soft off white to a deep, burnt orange. Not when it eventually slipped from view and the crickets began to sing their nightly song.
There was no need to. Rumi had all the food she could possibly need, and her bedroom had an ensuite. Technically speaking, she probably should use the button that Celine had given her to call the doctor rather than hop around on one leg like an unbalanced flamingo, but the second option was at least mildly entertaining.
Rumi's TV continued to chatter on. The night grew dark, and her eyes heavy, even as the last of Rumi's painkillers faded and the full, unadulterated pain of her leg knitting itself back together at a speed that was both impossible, and inadvisable became clear.
It wasn't quite a throb anymore. More like a swarm of angry bees had taken residence beneath the skin and were trying their hardest to burrow their way into her bones. Despite her best efforts the tears that had been welling finally went over. Sliding softly down her cheeks and jaw, meeting in the soft fur of her stuffed bear.
There was a button, Rumi knew, somewhere, to summon the doctor. A button, given to her explicitly to summon the doctor when the painkillers started to wear off.
It was hard, though, to remember that with the buzzing, electric static pulsing through her leg. Even harder to think about moving to try and locate it, when she shifted her weight and it sent a bolt through her entire left side.
Rumi hiccuped. A choked, broken thing.
The dam shattered.
Rumi sobbed. Shuddering, wracking, trembling. Gasping and coughing, whimpering and gnashing teeth that were a bit too human for it to be intimidating. Her grip on her plush tightened to the point of seams creaking, and tightened further still.
Rumi screamed. High-pitched and unyielding. The posters and paintings on the walls rattling in their carefully selected, procured placements. Put there by some stranger Rumi had never met, for a child that she would never see.
And still. No one came.
Rumi cried until she fell asleep. Too exhausted for even the pain to keep her awake anymore.
She dreamed of hands enclosed around her. Cradling her softly against something warm. Of a voice humming a lullaby, even as the hands pulled away and the warmth was lost. She dreamed that the lullaby wrapped around her still, and that the notes alone were enough to keep her warm.
Cold.
It splashes around her. Springing up the skin of her sides, over the top of her chest, stopping just below the shoulders. Her entire lower half encased in what must be ice.
Rumi's eyes spring open, even as the muscles around them scream in protest. A harsh gasp erupting from her chest, only to turn into a cough the moment it breaches.
"I know— I know—" someone is saying, but Rumi can't parse the speaker. Can't even turn to see them. All she can focus on is the cold.
A hand catches hers. Eyes flashing in the corners of her vision. She blinks. Perplexed by the sensation of seeing without processing. The knowledge of shapes and colors and objects before her, but no real awareness of what they mean.
"Rumes, breathe." Another voice says. This one firmer than the last. On reflex, Rumi obliges, and nearly swallows a mouthful of what she is slowly realizing is bath water.
"Shit— okay not what I meant-"
"Mira, she's slipping—"
Hands grab beneath Rumi's armpits, hauling her up. Rumi blinks, trying to figure out what is going on, she might as well be trying to grasp sand. It keeps slipping through her fingers.
It's so cold.
"I know," the first voice is saying again. Soothing. "It'll be over soon, okay. We just gotta get your temperature down. Just ten minutes. Do you think you can do that for me, Rumi?"
There's a blob in front of her. Pale with a dark mop on top. Two twinkling pits that Rumi thinks might be eyes. She tries to focus on them, but she can't really. Her vision is slipping.
"S'cold," she mutters. The blob hums in sympathy.
"I know baby, but you're burning up."
Something presses against Rumi's forehead. Cold, but in a different way than the water surrounding her. Softer. She finds herself leaning into it before she can even think to question it.
"Feel's like a stovetop." The second voice deadpans. "You could cook eggs on this."
For a moment Rumi has the mental image of someone cracking an egg on her forehead and it makes a series of breathy giggles bubble up from her chest.
The blob in front of her makes a noise that sounds like it doesn't know if it wants to be nervous or reassuring.
"She's laughing, is that good?"
"Why're you asking me?"
"Who the hell else am I gonna ask?"
"I don't know? Naver?"
"Naver!" the blob intones, incredulous. They fling up a hand and, in the process, send a splash of cold water over the side of Rumi's face. Rumi recoils, lips pulling back in instinctual dislike.
She hisses.
The room stills.
"Did… did you just hiss at me?"
Rumi stares. Shivers. No more water is thrown at her so she doesn't feel the need for an immediate reprise.
The blob reaches forward, water dripping from their fingers.
Rumi growls.
The blob retreats.
"Alright. Okay. That's… new."
"Probably a demon quirk, yeah? Unless Rumi's got any other surprise supernatural secrets she neglected to share."
"Hmmn," The blob hums. They take a moment, drying off their hand carefully before reaching for Rumi again.
A low rumble starts in the base of her chest before she can even think of whether she wants to or not, but fortunately stays there. Even as the fingers encroach ever closer and come to rest against her cheek. They curl along her jaw, and for some reason the feeling of blunted nails against her skin makes something buckle in Rumi's chest and suddenly the hand is the only thing keeping her head aloft. The rumbling has lightened into something softer and far more airy. It clicks strangely in the back of her throat along with a strange urge to grab something with her hands.
One finds the edge of the tub, another something soft and warm. She clenches it, then releases. Over and over. Rhythmic. Soothing.
"What…?" The lower voice starts, the blob shushes her.
"She's… purring…?"
There's a long pause in which the only sounds are the rumbling and the gentle lapping of water against the sides of the tub.
"Yeah and using my forearm as a stress ball," the lower voice continues, "Since when did being a demon equal being a giant cat?"
"I don't know!" The blob exclaims, though it sounds more exasperated than actually upset. The hand at Rumi's cheek digs in a bit too hard and Rumi can't help the whine that escapes her in displeasure.
There's another pause as the bodies shift around her. The blob shushes her, rubbing gently at the spot in apology and soon the rumbling has started again.
"I don't know," the blob says again, though much calmer this time. "and it's not like we can ask her right now."
"I still think we should call."
"And say what?! If you're wrong-"
"But if I'm right-"
"If-"
"Can you two," Rumi manages to pry her eyes open, though she hadn't remembered closing them, and makes an educated guess based off of the hair colors. "S'pobickering?"
Zoey's head cocks to one side as she struggles to parse her words through the slur. Mira tosses hers backwards with a scoff.
"She speaks! I was worried for a minute that your brain had melted from the fever." A finger pokes at Rumi's unoccupied cheek. She wrinkles her nose in annoyance.
"Nah melted," she grumbles and then blinks a couple times as her vision starts to recognize the familiar shapes and lighting of Mira's ensuite bathroom. As well as the large, jacuzzi-style tub that they'd all fought hand and foot over when they first moved into the apartment. Mira had won, but only because she was tall enough to hold the key out of their reach. "Why'mmm I inna tub?"
Zoey's face winces. Or, Rumi thinks she does. Her vision's still a little blurry.
"Because your fever was getting, like, really high… like, concerningly high. Mira said we should've taken you to the hospital, but—"
"No I didn't!" Mira interrupts, color flushing along the tops of her cheeks. Zoey ignores her, continuing as if she hadn't spoken.
"But I knew you'd flip out if you found out we risked paparazzi, especially so soon after…" Zoey trails off and Mira looks pointedly at the floor. She clears her throat. "Plus, like… we didn't know if the fever was, like… a demon thing…?"
Rumi absorbs that slowly. The water around her lapping at her sides almost hypnotically. It's less cold now, or maybe it was never cold to begin with? She remembers something about a lukewarm bath being a way to help cool someone down from a fever. Just the perception of it being skewed for said fever-striken patient.
"mmmaybe?" she mutters, "Never 'append 'fore."
"That's reassuring." Mira deadpans. Zoey elbows her, releasing her grip on Rumi's face. She misses it immediately.
"Wellla'lot of this's ne'er 'append 'fore," Rumi continues, "I dinnit 'ven know I cou tel'port 'fore las nigh..."
Mira and Zoey exchange glances that are too blurry for Rumi to read.
"Ru," Mira starts, carefully. "What did you mean earlier when you said that Celine knows?"
Rumi wrinkles her brow. "C'line knows." She answers.
Mira huffs.
"No, I mean, like… she knows what? That you're…."
"A demon."
"Okay," Zoey continues, "But, like… how? When? Why did she not… like…"
"Kill me?" Rumi finishes.
There's a beat. A long one. Zoey's mouth caught open like she simply forgot to shut it.
"I… I was going to say, tell us. Or, like…" Zoey trails off, at a loss for words. Rumi can't quite make out her expression, but it sure is one.
Mira takes over.
"Rumi." She leans forward, reaching over the wall of the tub to grab at Rumi's right hand and hold it in a gentle, yet firm grip. "When did these," she rubs her thumb over the back of her hand, tracing the curl of a soft, iridescent pattern. "start?"
Ah.
"Waz born wi' em." She explains. "Da' wazza demon. C'line knew from the start..."
Mira's hand doesn't move. But something changes in her posture. Zoey's too. For a moment the silence in the bathroom is terribly, deafeningly loud.
"She…" Zoey's voice catches. It's so small, smaller than Rumi thinks she's ever heard it, and she'd been there when Zoey was just 15 and curled into a ball behind her bunk in the Hunter's compound. Quietly whispering about how she missed her Dad's pancakes, even as she still bore the scars on the backs of her hands from cigarettes put out on her skin.
Mira's hand releases Rumi's. In the same breath she stands. Posture tight and eyes a maelstrom. She turns on her heel and marches straight out the bathroom door, not even bothering to shut it behind her.
It was only a moment before they both heard the dial tone.
Zoey straightens, curses, and scrambles after her, leaving Rumi alone in the bathtub, unsure of what was going on.
There's a scuffle, Zoey urging Mira not to, but Mira did not deign her a reply. Not when the call connects and Zoey barely gets a final, pleading, "Mira-" out before Mira is screaming.
"Where the FUCK do you get off—"
The rest of the tirade is lost. The words melt together into just the familiar timber of Mira's voice. Even as full of rage as it is, Rumi can't help but find it comforting, the ire not directed at her.
She leans against the wall of the tub, careful to fold her arms over the lip before resting her head against them. That way, if she did fall asleep, she would be propped up before she slipped beneath the water. The last thing she wants to do is scare Zoey and Mira any more than she already has.
Mira's screaming continues for a while. Long enough that Rumi is starting to get concerned. There weren't enough pauses in there for the other person to get a word in edgewise. Much less any for her to breathe. Eventually, though she runs out of steam— or simply oxygen— and there is the distant crackle of a digital reply, lost through the walls with ample sound insulation Rumi had insisted on after their last apartment's lack of it had left her far too aware of Zoey's internet history.
"Hesitate?!" Zoey's voice picks up where Mira's left off, though there was less rage in her voice than simple disbelief. "We could've killed her!"
"We almost did." Mira finishes darkly. The phone crackles again, Rumi can't make out if the speaker is even male or female. Her head has started pounding again, her vision growing fuzzy at the edges. She allows her eyes to shut, hoping that the lack of light will help.
"Aware? The fuck do you mean, aware?!"
More crackling.
"Rumi… what?"
A pause.
Then.
"No. No, you do not get to pull any 'Rumi should be the one to tell you,' bullshit when you're the reason she never fucking told us anything for the past seven goddamn years!"
There was silence. The throbbing in Rumi's head isn't getting better despite her best efforts. She tries to sit up, to press a hand against her brow like she could massage away the ache, but the shift in posture makes her lose her balance and suddenly she's unaware of which direction is the one gravity is supposed to pull in.
She hits the water.
Mira's phone clatters to the floor.